Changing IP address of a windows 2003 controller

[annie brugalle]

Hello,

I have seen documentation explaining how to rename a windows 2003 domain
controller (with netdom), but what about its ip address ?

We have a little forest with only one domain and two Windows 2000 controllers.
We would like to :

- upgrade our Windows 2000 Active Directory domain to a Windows server 2003 domain
- During this upgrade : replace our two Windows 2000 controllers machines with two
new machines (windows server 2003) but keeping their IP addresses (and name)

We actually have a non-dynamic Unix DNS server and we delegate the zones for the SRV records
to our Windows 2000 domain controllers.

Our controllers are WIN servers and DNS server only for zones containing SRV records.
These zones are delegated by our non-dynamic Unix DNS server to the Windows 2000 controllers.

Is it possible ? Is there precautions to take ?

thanks in advance for your help

Annie Brugallé

 

[Laura E. Hunter \(MVP\)]

Changing the IP address on a 2003 server is pretty straightforward - I don't
even think that it requires a reboot (but I could be wrong, I'm in a hotel
room and don't have a 2K3 box in front of me at the moment.)

All 2003 name resolution and resource sharing depends on the DNS name, not
the IP address. So as long as the change gets updated to your DNS servers
in a timely and correct fashion, your clients shouldn't even notice the
change. If you're dealing with cached records or servers that don't update
regularly, then you might run into a situation where a client is still
trying to hit an outdated DNS record, but that can be fixed through the
usual means.